Viktor Orban and aides vanish from sight after Hungarian election loss

BUDAPEST – Mr Viktor Orban and his top lieutenants dominated Hungary’s airwaves over his 16 years in power.

But since the landslide election on April 12, they are nowhere to be found.

Mr Orban gave a short concession speech on the evening of April 12, acknowledging that his Fidesz party had suffered a “painful” loss and promising to continue serving Hungary in opposition.

Since then, his Facebook page, ordinarily a flurry of activity, has gone quiet.

So, too, has that of the pro-Kremlin foreign minister, Mr Peter Szijjarto, one of the faces of Mr Orban’s campaign who has been known for frequent daily social media posts. Mr Szijjarto was conspicuously absent from the stage where the nationalist leader conceded the vote.

“Where’s Szijjarto gone?” Dr Andrea Varga-Damm, an outgoing opposition lawmaker, asked on social media.

The question was reverberating in Hungary, where Mr Peter Magyar, whose party won the historic election on April 12, had campaigned on bringing the Orban-connected elite to justice amid widespread allegations of corruption and the use of Russia-style methods, including the targeting of journalists and the opposition.

The outgoing foreign minister had become the face of Mr Orban’s cosy relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin, having travelled to Moscow more than a dozen times since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Mr Magyar has called the minister a “case carrier” for Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

The publication of leaked phone calls during the final days of the campaign, in which Mr Szijjarto volunteered to Mr Lavrov his services to dilute European Union sanctions against Russia, did not help. Mr Szijjarto called it routine diplomacy.

Since the night of April 12, his only activity was to change the background on his Facebook page to the Hungarian flag – an apparent attempt to rebuff questions about his allegiance.

The foreign ministry in Budapest did not respond to a request for comment.

Before the election, some had speculated Mr Szijjarto might leave the country in case of a defeat.

Mr Magyar has talked publicly about unconfirmed reports that some of the biggest beneficiaries of Mr Orban’s rule were in the process of moving their assets abroad.

Some have already left. Mr Orban’s daughter Rahel and son-in-law, Mr Istvan Tiborcz, who became one of Hungary’s richest couples over Mr Orban’s 16 years in power by accumulating a property and hospitality empire, moved to New York before the vote, in what they had said was a family decision. They have not given a return date.

Another person to keep silent after Mr Orban’s defeat was Mr Donald Trump. The US President had endorsed Mr Orban before the vote.

Asked about the outcome of the election on an airport tarmac, Mr Trump turned around and walked away. BLOOMBERG